As good as it feels to purge and clean, it doesn't attack the problem: the source of the stuff. Generalizing for a bit, the nature of the stuff in question does matter, so some of my ideas may not translate across all realms of purchasable goods. However, I've found that the less I buy, the easier it is to maintain my owned items. Plus, the whole "saving money" thing.
1) Focus on the bad.
There's a Buddhist meditation technique called Patikulamanasikara that kills lust by focusing on the negative aspects of the human anatomy. While we're not engaging in the removal of lust for human beings (that seems rather unhealthy unless you devote yourself to a monk's life), it's a useful technique for everyday shopping. Make a "pros" and "cons" list, and really pour over the cons.
I'm not promoting being a cynic and being cranky about everything, but instead of visualizing the best situation, try to visualize the worst. For example, don't imagine a new gadget will renovate your life and change the way you live. Honestly, how often does that even happen? Rather, imagine that it's just like every other mediocre gadget you have. It doesn't change anything and leaves a bad taste in your mouth. You're left with buyer's remorse, and the gadget ends up in a drawer somewhere, eating up your time and space. Maybe that's not the reality, but it's closer to the truth than what we usually build up in our minds.
2) Focus on what you already have.
If the key is entertainment or leisure, it's hard to argue that we need more media when we're already surrounded by more than most people can ever consume in a lifetime. Most people have backlogs of every media format, or they have some hidden gems they forgot about that they haven't experienced in a while. The best way for me to forget about a desire or want is to go read a book. It readjusts my priorities in a positive way.
And this can encompass many other things. You probably have access to a library, which alone can busy a person for an entire lifetime. The Internet, and the legal side of Internet downloads. Your friends and family. All of these resources can keep you engaged without buying anything.
But for non-media stuff, we still forget what we have. Are you sure you can't go without? You've gone without your entire life. Just wait. Keep waiting.
3) Use and buy smart.
You likely have a computer if you're reading this blog, so you're capable of accessing more useful information than you can ever imagine. Use it to get the most out of what you have. If you need to buy something, fine, but use the Internet to figure out what will work best for you.
This does a few things. It makes your purchase more geared toward what you need, and how to perform whatever task you need the stuff to do. But it also makes the purchase slightly more arduous, and forces you to think about whether or not it's useful in the first place. You start to think like a utilitarian, focused on the end-game.
4) Used.
If you wait long enough, somebody probably has what you need that you can borrow, have, or buy for cheap. Yes, this requires patience. Sometimes it's not easy. But you can get your stuff for less money or even none at all.
I went without a bike for three weeks, and I walked instead. But when I got myself a relative's perfectly serviceable road bike for no cost, it was worth it. Now somebody else has less trash and I have what I need.
5) Avoid advertisements and purchasing tricks.
As previously discussed, advertisements are successful at making consumers irrational and think about purchases differently. But remember that stores are designed to get you to buy certain items. If you're shopping, have a list and stick to it. Be aware of the environment. Never impulse buy. You can always get it later.
I used to fall into the trap of "well it's on sale, so if I'm going to get it, I should get it now." If it's worth buying, you can wait and maybe miss the sale. It won't kill you, and it will give you more time to ponder the purchase.
6) Do it for you.
Don't buy stuff for anybody but yourself. This seems obvious, but too many times you'll find that what we thought was a need was actually an external standard we were projecting onto our own lives. So do it because you think it's right, not because somebody told you it was. Take advice but keep your salt shaker handy.
You don't need to buy something to be like your hero or favorite blogger. Actions define us.
7) You don't have to upgrade.
Just because there's a new Macbook Air doesn't mean you need to buy it. It's easy to think that you should upgrade because, well, it's something that I know I use a lot, I should have the best there is, right? Not necessarily. Again, these products are designed to make you want to upgrade. Be realistic about the differences between models. You're fine where you are; do you really need this new upgraded version to make things better? Likely not.
Your gear doesn't make you more minimalist. Your actions do.
Social Networking
Facebook and its peers have been vilified recently as a sort of antagonist of simple living and minimalism. Is this entirely accurate? I don't think that you are required to go without social networking to be minimalist, especially if there are people in your life you wish to keep up with. Facebook in particular can be a very easy way to see social information in a small span of time, and in some social circles, it can be more reliable than other forms of communication.
Of course, there is a negative to everything. Social networks exist to collect and sell your information. This is the cost of using these networks: you are agreeing to reduce your privacy. To combat this, you can do what I do: make everything on my profile so blindingly obvious or pointless that I don't care if it's not private. Remembering what should be public or private is a relatively simple endeavor, and there's some information I simply don't care about. Is it really a big secret that I like Radiohead?
In addition, the stream of social information can be overbearing. In my roughly daily use of Facebook, whenever I see a game, app or excessive post, I either eliminate the source or limit their posts to "important only," which gives me only what I really care about: my friends' pictures and posts. In addition, only adding the people you want to hear from on your Facebook is another way to reduce the rush from a raging waterfall into a pleasant - and useful - brook. I keep my connections low, around 50 to 100 people, and feign inactivity for the unwanted people who pester me into "friending" them (as snobbish as it sounds, not everybody can be important to me).
We must also keep in mind that Facebook won't be popular forever. As with every new technology concept, it will balloon and likely burst. Where will the winds blow next? Likely in a new iteration of social interaction. But none of these networks are inherently evil; they are just tools that we need to use properly. And they are generally useful tools, though how useful will matter more on the company you keep. Just like I wouldn't suggest eliminating your friends and social life in the quest for a more minimalist life, I won't suggest deleting the social networks without thinking through the situation.
Of course, there is a negative to everything. Social networks exist to collect and sell your information. This is the cost of using these networks: you are agreeing to reduce your privacy. To combat this, you can do what I do: make everything on my profile so blindingly obvious or pointless that I don't care if it's not private. Remembering what should be public or private is a relatively simple endeavor, and there's some information I simply don't care about. Is it really a big secret that I like Radiohead?
In addition, the stream of social information can be overbearing. In my roughly daily use of Facebook, whenever I see a game, app or excessive post, I either eliminate the source or limit their posts to "important only," which gives me only what I really care about: my friends' pictures and posts. In addition, only adding the people you want to hear from on your Facebook is another way to reduce the rush from a raging waterfall into a pleasant - and useful - brook. I keep my connections low, around 50 to 100 people, and feign inactivity for the unwanted people who pester me into "friending" them (as snobbish as it sounds, not everybody can be important to me).
We must also keep in mind that Facebook won't be popular forever. As with every new technology concept, it will balloon and likely burst. Where will the winds blow next? Likely in a new iteration of social interaction. But none of these networks are inherently evil; they are just tools that we need to use properly. And they are generally useful tools, though how useful will matter more on the company you keep. Just like I wouldn't suggest eliminating your friends and social life in the quest for a more minimalist life, I won't suggest deleting the social networks without thinking through the situation.
The Mind: Focus and Consistency
People forget the power of the mind. They forget that to unlock these powers, you need to train yourself. They think that the way their minds work are forever locked into certain patterns, and that no amount of training can bring them out of it.
The two mind powers I use for minimalism are "focus" and "consistency."
Focus
When you are truly thinking about something, and it becomes you, everything else just drops away. This is the very core of minimalism. Your focus, your passion, your desire for this one thing is so strong that the rest of the fluff doesn't even enter the equation. You don't need the fluff. You barely even think about the fluff. So you remove it to get it out of the way.
Even if we're not as strong as the above paragraph would require us to be, we can get closer to this principle. If you love something, focus on it. If it doesn't bear the weight of your attention, then maybe it wasn't worth your time. But if you really do love it, you feel whole. You feel completed.
Focus can be achieved in a manner of ways. It can be practiced in everyday life. Live your life as a series of episodes, where you focus on your task and give everything as much attention as you can. Our society doesn't train us to do this - some aspects actively train you against it - so it may not come easily. Other methods include meditation (which beginners may want to seek professional help with) or a certain passion to unlock the mind (for me these are detailed in the "My Minimalism" blogs).
Consistency
Consistency can be seen as a sustained focus. If you draw your attention into a specific target and are rewarded with good feelings, maintaining that focus is key to keeping your mind at ease.
Focus isn't good enough by itself. We focus and then we lose the focus, and we wander off and forget what made our target so special. By turning our actions into habits, we can make the focus a part of us as opposed to something we do on and off - making the choices we make matter more than just a temporary whim.
If we're serious about making these changes in our lives, it's not enough to make a blog, post five entries to it, and then forget about the whole thing. You need the long-term focus to make any meaningful impact. Five minutes of minimalism now won't make any difference in five years.
Consistency can be achieved through writing, listening, self-examination, and even blogging.
The two mind powers I use for minimalism are "focus" and "consistency."
Focus
When you are truly thinking about something, and it becomes you, everything else just drops away. This is the very core of minimalism. Your focus, your passion, your desire for this one thing is so strong that the rest of the fluff doesn't even enter the equation. You don't need the fluff. You barely even think about the fluff. So you remove it to get it out of the way.
Even if we're not as strong as the above paragraph would require us to be, we can get closer to this principle. If you love something, focus on it. If it doesn't bear the weight of your attention, then maybe it wasn't worth your time. But if you really do love it, you feel whole. You feel completed.
Focus can be achieved in a manner of ways. It can be practiced in everyday life. Live your life as a series of episodes, where you focus on your task and give everything as much attention as you can. Our society doesn't train us to do this - some aspects actively train you against it - so it may not come easily. Other methods include meditation (which beginners may want to seek professional help with) or a certain passion to unlock the mind (for me these are detailed in the "My Minimalism" blogs).
Consistency
Consistency can be seen as a sustained focus. If you draw your attention into a specific target and are rewarded with good feelings, maintaining that focus is key to keeping your mind at ease.
Focus isn't good enough by itself. We focus and then we lose the focus, and we wander off and forget what made our target so special. By turning our actions into habits, we can make the focus a part of us as opposed to something we do on and off - making the choices we make matter more than just a temporary whim.
If we're serious about making these changes in our lives, it's not enough to make a blog, post five entries to it, and then forget about the whole thing. You need the long-term focus to make any meaningful impact. Five minutes of minimalism now won't make any difference in five years.
Consistency can be achieved through writing, listening, self-examination, and even blogging.
Her Two Rules
I traveled a bit in the past month to keep my wits about me, and it was an undeniable pleasure to see such a different world. Urban environments are very different from suburban-esque towns, and while I appreciate the quiet of my home, I still very much enjoy to explore alternate means of living. If there was a single word I would put to the point of my life, it would be "exploration."
In the first trip I took, I met an older lady who was well versed in the traveling ways and she gave me two pieces of advice that she moves and lives by. I listened to her delightful stories over a bright breakfast about a month ago.
1) You can't do everything.
You are finite. You are limited. And you must prioritize. Not coming to terms with this will lead to unhappiness and bitterness.
2) Never forget to pack your sense of humor and your perspective.
Things may go wrong. You may feel overwhelmed, or busy within your own little mind. We forget that there's a world around us, and it is bigger and more complex than any single mind can comprehend. If you can't see that, and stop taking yourself too seriously, the weight of a subjective and heavily emotional perspective - a trait we all share as human beings - will get to you and render you less productive.
In the first trip I took, I met an older lady who was well versed in the traveling ways and she gave me two pieces of advice that she moves and lives by. I listened to her delightful stories over a bright breakfast about a month ago.
1) You can't do everything.
You are finite. You are limited. And you must prioritize. Not coming to terms with this will lead to unhappiness and bitterness.
2) Never forget to pack your sense of humor and your perspective.
Things may go wrong. You may feel overwhelmed, or busy within your own little mind. We forget that there's a world around us, and it is bigger and more complex than any single mind can comprehend. If you can't see that, and stop taking yourself too seriously, the weight of a subjective and heavily emotional perspective - a trait we all share as human beings - will get to you and render you less productive.
Dangers of Projection
I know this may sound strange, but don't take this blog, or any blog, seriously. Don't look at me or any other blogger and hold yourself up to these characters and wonder if you match up.
Why? Because you don't have the full story. You never will. Blogs are a selective connection, lacking so many smaller details about a person you never learn.
Some of the blogs are designed to specifically hold back information to make a clean projection of what they want you to think. I won't do that. But I also won't go out of my way to point out the flaws in my system unless it's relevant. You won't know about how I falter and don't always do what I preach on this blog. As much as I think about minimalism, I'm not perfect. Nobody is. Never trust a blog that says they are, especially if they have something to gain from you thinking so, like an ebook sale.
So if you look at the minimalist blogs and compare them to yourself and despair, what happens? You hold yourself back. You're holding yourself up to external standards that probably don't even exist.
Blogs are useful, but you have to take them on a case-by-case basis. Use their ideas. Implement suggestions that work for you. Be selective and judgmental.
Why? Because you don't have the full story. You never will. Blogs are a selective connection, lacking so many smaller details about a person you never learn.
Some of the blogs are designed to specifically hold back information to make a clean projection of what they want you to think. I won't do that. But I also won't go out of my way to point out the flaws in my system unless it's relevant. You won't know about how I falter and don't always do what I preach on this blog. As much as I think about minimalism, I'm not perfect. Nobody is. Never trust a blog that says they are, especially if they have something to gain from you thinking so, like an ebook sale.
So if you look at the minimalist blogs and compare them to yourself and despair, what happens? You hold yourself back. You're holding yourself up to external standards that probably don't even exist.
Blogs are useful, but you have to take them on a case-by-case basis. Use their ideas. Implement suggestions that work for you. Be selective and judgmental.
New Name! MGL is now aberMinimal.
Minimalist GNU/Linux is now aberMinimal, which is the same name as the tumblr.
The URL will stay the way it is despite its inaccuracy because I like getting linked to.
Why the name change?
Number one. Easier for me to type. I'm bad at slashes in names and MGL is a terrible acronym.
Number two. Links the tumblr and the blogspot account. As much as I like tumblr, long text is better on blogspot. It also segregates the tumblr's smaller ideas and images from the blogspot's larger essays.
Number three. Better branding. I'm gathering some popularity and traffic and I'd like to make it clear what I'm doing here. I'm not about Linux anymore.
Number four. I want to have the "aberinkulas" name somewhat frontal for the blog's author. If Batman movies teach me anything, it's the importance of theatrics and money. But also presence, which is another good thing.
I also want to take the time to thank everyone who has started following this blog in the past month, in addition to everyone who was following me before and has read my stuff ever since I started by getting into a tussle with that guy who runs/ran MNMAL. As much as this blog is for me, I can't describe how it feels to have your ideas spread like wildfire; ideas that you think will make people's lives better.
Please feel free to comment all over any blog entry, and contact me at my author name with "mails" appended on the end at gmail dot com.
The URL will stay the way it is despite its inaccuracy because I like getting linked to.
Why the name change?
Number one. Easier for me to type. I'm bad at slashes in names and MGL is a terrible acronym.
Number two. Links the tumblr and the blogspot account. As much as I like tumblr, long text is better on blogspot. It also segregates the tumblr's smaller ideas and images from the blogspot's larger essays.
Number three. Better branding. I'm gathering some popularity and traffic and I'd like to make it clear what I'm doing here. I'm not about Linux anymore.
Number four. I want to have the "aberinkulas" name somewhat frontal for the blog's author. If Batman movies teach me anything, it's the importance of theatrics and money. But also presence, which is another good thing.
I also want to take the time to thank everyone who has started following this blog in the past month, in addition to everyone who was following me before and has read my stuff ever since I started by getting into a tussle with that guy who runs/ran MNMAL. As much as this blog is for me, I can't describe how it feels to have your ideas spread like wildfire; ideas that you think will make people's lives better.
Please feel free to comment all over any blog entry, and contact me at my author name with "mails" appended on the end at gmail dot com.
My Minimalism: Writing
Write.
That is a very forceful suggestion, and it may be one of the most important pieces of advice I ever give.
My most powerful epiphanies and personal revelations have come from writing this blog. Sure, it may be vague and conceptual, but it's hard to communicate just how much it helps to see the words on the screen, after they have been translated from these clouds in my head into actual words and see how they can be applied. Writing through an idea requires me to fully understand what I'm saying, to see it from multiple perspectives and get a grip on exactly where the idea will take me.
Even though I've never shared my real name or information on this blog (I never found it important) it's almost like I have this thing I have to live up to. I know I am capable of becoming this thing that I write. It's not even a separate character, it's more like a projection of me through the lens that I have spent so much time creating. These ideas came from me, so I know I want this and can do it. Reading these words, and feeling the pride from writing them down, it gives me the energy I need to embrace what I type.
You don't have to write like I do. You don't have to be good at it. I certainly wasn't when I started blogging, and I still make mistakes. (An entry on books shouldn't have spelling issues.) You don't have to make it public, although you can and if you do give me a link. You can type it, or write it on real paper, or engrave it into stone tablets. I keep a lot of personal writing to myself, which I sometimes make public. When it has served its purpose, I throw it away. I do it because it helps sort out the mind and the weird way it works.
The more you write about yourself, the better vocabulary you have to deal with your intricacies, and the better self-awareness you can build. The more you write, the easier it becomes to come up with new ideas, think of things from a different perspective, and to talk to yourself about the things that matter most. Write for you and the rest will come.
That is a very forceful suggestion, and it may be one of the most important pieces of advice I ever give.
My most powerful epiphanies and personal revelations have come from writing this blog. Sure, it may be vague and conceptual, but it's hard to communicate just how much it helps to see the words on the screen, after they have been translated from these clouds in my head into actual words and see how they can be applied. Writing through an idea requires me to fully understand what I'm saying, to see it from multiple perspectives and get a grip on exactly where the idea will take me.
Even though I've never shared my real name or information on this blog (I never found it important) it's almost like I have this thing I have to live up to. I know I am capable of becoming this thing that I write. It's not even a separate character, it's more like a projection of me through the lens that I have spent so much time creating. These ideas came from me, so I know I want this and can do it. Reading these words, and feeling the pride from writing them down, it gives me the energy I need to embrace what I type.
You don't have to write like I do. You don't have to be good at it. I certainly wasn't when I started blogging, and I still make mistakes. (An entry on books shouldn't have spelling issues.) You don't have to make it public, although you can and if you do give me a link. You can type it, or write it on real paper, or engrave it into stone tablets. I keep a lot of personal writing to myself, which I sometimes make public. When it has served its purpose, I throw it away. I do it because it helps sort out the mind and the weird way it works.
The more you write about yourself, the better vocabulary you have to deal with your intricacies, and the better self-awareness you can build. The more you write, the easier it becomes to come up with new ideas, think of things from a different perspective, and to talk to yourself about the things that matter most. Write for you and the rest will come.
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